


"my one and only love" (1963).

by poalimal



Category: The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Gen, Implied Relationships, Murder Mystery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-27
Updated: 2019-05-27
Packaged: 2020-03-20 02:29:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 987
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18983362
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/poalimal/pseuds/poalimal
Summary: Sam's a private detective far too nosy for his own good. Misty's the best thing to happen to the NYPD. After several years of butting heads over crime scenes, they... come to an agreement. A mutual understanding, if you will.





	"my one and only love" (1963).

**Author's Note:**

> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ecrE80rnjhw

 

'--and by the time I came to,' said Kenneth, a ghastly look on his face, 'there was blood everywhere, and h-he was dead! And his face was-- I, I must have screamed or something, I don't remember. I tried to save him, you have to believe me! Next thing I know, Misty broke down the door, and-- and--'

Kenneth's face crumpled: his voice broke, he started to cry. Misty put her arm around him, sympathy writ all over her face.

'I'm sorry to ask these questions,' said Sam, giving Kenneth his handkerchief. 'I'm sure you loved him very much.'

'No, I, I, I understand,' said Kenneth, hiccuping with sobs. 'It-it's just your job.' Sweet kid, Sam thought, somewhat cynically. What was he doing hanging around a place like this?

'Well, _I_ don't understand,' said the security guard, Christian. He'd glared at Sam suspiciously the whole way up in the service elevator. 'Who are you, Misty's partner, or what?'

Unexpectedly, Sam ran out of words. 'Sam occasionally liaises with the NYPD,' Misty said, straightening all the way up in her Darkwing Duck pyjamas. Sam grinned wryly at her phrasing. That was certainly one way of putting their relationship. It was lucky he'd, ah, been in the area. 'He and I will conduct interviews until everyone else can get here. Traffic's backed up for miles 'cus of the Midnight Parade.'

Kenneth shrunk away from his apartment door and started trembling in earnest. Misty turned to him with a soothing smile: 'Don't worry, Ken, you can stay in my apartment till the coroner comes.' Sam swallowed a pang of annoyance. Obviously no one would want to spend hours in a room with a dead body, least of all the dead body of their fiancé. Anyway, he'd already known the night was going to go very differently from what he'd planned the minute he'd chained his bike up outside Misty's place and seen the _SOS_ text. 

Neither of them would be getting any sleep anytime soon.

'Thank you,' Kenneth said, wiping his face. Sam flicked a glance at the watch on his wrist, then at the shoes on his feet. The watch was tasteful but it was the shoes - older pair, well-kept, _very_ expensive - that really sparked his interest. How old was Kenneth, maybe early 20's? Unlikely that his fiancé, whom he'd described meeting in 'a whirlwind romance', would have bought them for him, then. It was more likely that someone wealthy - a relative, maybe, or an ex? - had gotten them for him.

Sam looked past Kenneth into his apartment, where, on the other side of the couch, the body of a much older man with a mutilated face lay.

Really... what was he doing in a place like this?

Misty was shaking her head, looking down into the street where tens of strangers had climbed out of their gridlocked cars, long past impatience and deep into resignation, and were talking like old friends.

'I don't get it,' she said, almost as if to herself. 'Who kills somebody on New Year's Eve? That's just bad juju.' She scrunched up her nose, probably hearing her mother in her words. 'Or somethin'.'

'Oh, Richie was superstitious, too,' Kenneth said, laughing wetly. 'He said he wanted to get married on New Year's Day, not on Christmas, so that he could celebrate the first day of the, the rest of our--'

'Where are you going?' said Christian, cutting into Kenneth's weeping.

At the end of the hall, Sam turned around. He pointed at the elevator, which he'd been unsuccessfully trying to hail for the past three minutes. 'This doesn't work.'

'Yea, it's been messed up for months,' said Christian, looking annoyed. 'What's your point?'

'When you used the key on the service elevator downstairs, you mentioned that the stairs were inaccessible today because of construction on the second floor,' said Sam. 'What happens in the event of a fire?'

'What's that got to do with anything?' Christian snapped. 'A man was just murdered and you want to talk safety codes?'

Misty stepped in front of Kenneth, her posture brisk and bristling even from a distance. Sam really, really didn't like being so far away from her - but he had to stop being so overprotective. He didn't have the right. 'If a fire had broken out,' Misty was saying, 'a lot more people would have been murdered due to _your_ negligence.'

'Hey, hey, listen,' said Christian, holding up his hands and backing up. His uniform really strained against his shoulders when he did that. 'I've only been here for three months, I just do what my boss tells me.'

Kenneth let out a little sob. 'It was supposed to be our three month anniversary Sunday,' he said pitifully.

'Oh, Ken,' said Misty, turning around to take him by the shoulder. 'Come over here, ok?, I've got some clothes you can change into...' And she gently led him in the opposite direction down the hallway, toward apartment 3C. Christian turned to watch them go.

Three months, huh? 'We can worry about the safety violations later,' said Sam, walking back down the hallway. 'For now, I need your help.' Christian's look of suspicion softened slightly, just as Sam had intended. 'I need you to stand in front of the stairwell while Misty and I interview all of the witnesses on this floor, just in case the murderer decides to make a break for it.'

Christian's lips twisted deeper into annoyance. 'I told you already, the stairs are closed off,' he said. 'This building only has three residential floors. You can't get up to the third floor from the first floor, and you can't get down to the first floor from the third.'

Sam smiled. 'All the more reason to shut off any potential exits,' he said. 'If there's only one way to get up to the third floor, then that means the murderer is still on this floor.'

 

**Author's Note:**

> I fundamentally lack the patience or attention to continuity required to write a full-on mystery. I'm pretty sure the only reason I was even able to plan the solution to this crime out is because I unintentionally borrowed the setting from some manga I don't remember (but will provide once I find it!)


End file.
